The term "pictures or images" is understood as meaning both pictures in the conventional sense, such as photographs, slides, drawings, etc., and other information records, such as pages of text, written items, etc., as well as living or dead objects.
Such known pieces of apparatus usually have a housing, a video camera with a lens, and a light source, which are generally fixed, in the form of a plurality of lamps, to flexible supports and serve for illuminating the picture or object; in a known apparatus, a mirror is located before the video camera in order to deflect the beam into the video camera. Consequently, the camera may point upwards, and a smaller height is possible. A light source in the sense of the invention produces predominantly visible light.
Thus, in the known pieces of apparatus, pictures are recorded by a video camera and are then reproduced on a screen or recorded or otherwise further processed in a known manner.
The disadvantage is that the known pieces of apparatus have only poor image definition. Furthermore, the illumination is generally very difficult to adjust so that there is frequently reflection on the pictures or the occurrence of shadows, which interferes with reproduction. In addition, heating of the lamps leads to disadvantages with regard to operation; contact with the lamps may cause burns. It is difficult to point the video camera at a desired point in the picture and to reduce or enlarge the latter, so that, in various known pieces of apparatus, orientation aids, such as light beams or the like, have to be projected onto the picture to permit orientation, for example on maps, and the lamps constantly have to be readjusted to achieve uniform illumination. This means additional expense and is not user-friendly.